A deliberate corruption of immer mitten festung (German for “Always in the middle of the fortress”), this particular martial art was put together by a black ops CIA project in the 1950s to train up its East German psionic espionage assets. The original goal was the usual telepathic deep viewing network, of course; but it turned out that the recruitable psions in that part of the Iron Curtain were mostly telekinetics, instead of telepaths. The CIA shrugged, and started training up psychokinetic assassins instead.

Mountains of Madness (directed by Guillermo del Toro; starring George Clooney, Octavia Spencer, Gary Oldman, and Kristen Stewart) was one of the highest-grossing films of 2011 on Homeline. Del Toro even managed to score John Williams for the soundtrack, which (as usual) netted Williams an Academy Award nomination. It’s widely considered to be one of Williams’ better work; the ‘Main Theme’ in particular somehow manages to be simultaneously peppy, pulpy, and deeply creepy, all at once. The tenth anniversary commemorative soundtrack is itself rather nice, with charmingly retro things like physical artwork — and an actual compact disc inside! The whole thing has “collector’s item” stamped all over it. Well, not literally, because that would be crass.

The seasons of the year have occult significance in mana-rich worlds, of course: and in some places (typically, high-mana areas) the change from one season to the next can cause the old season to more or less crystallize out of the air. This turns them into limited-college Manastones (GURPS Magic, pg 70), with the caveat that mages cannot actually create Crystallized Seasons: they’re the equivalent of a renewable resource, like bat guano. And, like bat guano, if somebody wants to collect the stuff regularly they’re going to have to be careful about it. Over-mining the areas where Crystallized Seasons occur can wreck it for further exploitation.

In their natural form, Husks look like sexless humanoids with short head hair and eyebrows. Left to themselves, Husks simply wait wherever they were placed last; they have no inherent skills of their own (including survival skills), but then again they last indefinitely. Strictly speaking, they’re not even alive. Certainly they don’t have organs or blood as we understand the term. They reproduce by budding, but it requires the active intervention of somebody sapient to start the process.